Liberia: Harmful Social and Environmental Impacts of Liberia Palm Oil Project Exposed

Apr 1, 2015 | Forest Peoples Prgrams
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Several years of fieldwork by the Forest Peoples Programme (FPP) and civil society partners in Liberia has revealed the extent to which palm oil company Golden Veroleum Liberia (GVL) and its lead investor Golden Agri-Resources (GAR) are continuing to operate without the free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) of local communities within their concession area, despite the companies’ claims to have learned from past mistakes.

The research has uncovered how GVL’s company procedures regarding FPIC are still highly inconsistent with relevant standards, including the Principles and Criteria of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) and GAR’s Forest Conservation Policy (FCP). Despite its commitments to meeting high social and environmental standards, GVL’s track record of engaging with communities in its concession area shows a continuing disregard for FPIC and other social obligations in practice. More worryingly this report suggests that given that the dominant palm oil business model relies on a vast undervaluation of community land, it is questioned whether such palm oil projects can ever be FPIC compliant.